Systems and methods for client-side contextual engagement

ABSTRACT

Disclosed is a new approach for client-side contextual engagement with a website visitor. A browser loads a page containing a reference to a script file implementing a visitor client. The visitor client may store visitor client data including site rules and a visitor profile locally on the client device. The visitor client may include a context monitor for calling the decision engine, a decision engine for evaluating the site rules relative to a context defined at least partially by events occurring on the page and the visitor profile, and a widget manager for managing visitor client data persisted on the client device. The content monitor may call the decision engine when the context changes. The decision engine may determine, in real time and relative to the context, that proactive or reactive engagement(s) may be appropriate and call the widget manager to launch and display corresponding engagement channel(s) on the page.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION(S)

This application is a continuation of, and claims a benefit of priorityfrom U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/819,043, filed Aug. 5, 2015,entitled “SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR CLIENT-SIDE CONTEXTUAL ENGAGEMENT,”now issued as U.S. Pat. No. 10,587,672, which claims a benefit ofpriority from U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/033,497, filed Aug. 5,2014, entitled “SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR CLIENT-SIDE CONTEXTUALENGAGEMENT,” which are fully incorporated by reference herein.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains materialwhich is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has noobjection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent documentor the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent and TrademarkOffice patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyrightrights whatsoever.

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This disclosure relates generally to customer engagement. Moreparticularly, embodiments disclosed herein relate to systems, methods,and computer program products for client-side contextual engagement withwebsite visitors.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Engaging website visitors in a timely manner with the correct customerengagement (e.g., presenting a discount offer on a product to a websitevisitor who has shown interest in the product; extending an invitationto a website visitor who has shown interest in a product to chat with asales agent about the product, etc.) has been proven to result in anincrease in sales and customer satisfaction.

Determining a correct type of customer engagement to present to awebsite visitor visiting a website usually requires a browser running ona client device to perform following steps:

-   1) On every page, make a request to an engagement server.    Optionally, this can be done through a JavaScript/Flash request with    additional data related to the page or the browser.-   2) Poll the engagement server for next action. Optionally, a socket    connection can be established and left open during an engagement.-   3) The engagement server responds with a recommended engagement to    display, and the details of the engagement.

An example of a server-based approach to customer engagement isillustrated in FIG. 1.

As shown in FIG. 1, system 100 may include a web browser application (orbrowser) 102, a website server 104, and an engagement server 106. Forevery web page requested (108), the server-based approach requires thatbrowser 102 makes a request to engagement server 106 (110). Engagementserver 106 is then periodically polled for a next action (112 a-112 c).Often, a socket connection between browser 102 and engagement server 106is established (via a particular port) and left open during anengagement. In response to each poll, engagement server 106 evaluatesengagement rules, determines whether to engage, and returns a responseto browser 102 (114 a-114 c). If the response from engagement server 106indicates a decision to engage, browser 102 then requests an engagementwidget from engagement server 106 for display through browser 102 (112d).

Several problems exist with this server-based approach. For example, itis not possible for an engagement server or a decision engine at theserver side to perform real-time decisioning on customer engagements. Ina polling scenario such as one illustrated in FIG. 1, there will alwaysbe a time gap between polls, during which no engagement that is based onthe current context of user interactions may be offered. Thisserver-based approach therefore risks potentially missing a criticalopportunity to react to context changes (due to user interactions suchas mouse movements or changes in form inputs).

As another example, in the open socket connection scenario, the rate atwhich a decision can be processed on the server-side can be impacted bythe load on the engagement server, the decision engine performance,and/or the transit time of the updated client information. These factorscan all adversely impact or affect the ability of an engagement serverto determine, in a timely manner, what engagement, if any, should beoffered.

Furthermore, with a server-based approach, contextually-relevantinformation such as the location of a user's pointing device is limitedto periodic updates and/or requires a stream of information travellingover network connection(s) which, again, can unfavorably impactperformance. The competing interests here include the level ofcontextual relevance and the speed of the decisioning process on anengagement server. Typically, the need for performance (so as to avoidhaving to take a long time to load a page during which a website visitormay leave the page) outweighs the need for contextual relevance. Thus,an engagement server may be provided with less information that iscontextually relevant to a page, a website visitor, or both. Thisunfortunately means that an engagement server can sometimes respond fastat the cost of accuracy and/or relevancy in determining a properengagement, resulting in reduced or poor customer engagements.

Another issue with the server-based approach relates to networkconnectivity of mobile devices. Mobile devices with poor connections areextremely difficult to support using either the poll or the socketconnection methods of the server-based approach described above.

Additionally, scalability can be a problematic issue, due at least inpart to every page for every visitor of a website needing to either pollan engagement server or keep an open socket connection to the engagementserver. Because the server requirements can be extremely high,scalability of the server-based approach is very limited, if notexceedingly cost-prohibitive.

As a result of these drawbacks, many websites take a simpler approach inwhich a page timer is used to trigger a decision to present anengagement. This time-based approach can also be problematic. Forexample, since contextual information from a page is not considered inthe time-based approach, it has no impact on a website's decision toengage a website visitor who is viewing and/or interacting with thepage. As such, there may not be any relationship between the websitevisitor's behavior on the page and the time-triggered decision topresent them with an engagement. As a result, the website visitor may bebombarded with unnecessary and/or inappropriate engagement offers,leading to reduced or poor customer engagements.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

Embodiments disclosed herein provide a client-side approach forcontextual engagement with website visitors. A system implementingclient-side contextual engagement disclosed herein may includeclient-side visitor engagement control logic, referred to herein as a“Visitor Client,” operating on a user device such as a smartphone,tablet, laptop computer, personal computer, etc., and client-side datastorage for persisting on the user device certain components such assite rules, visitor profile data, and optionally engagement widgets,etc.

According to embodiments, instead of polling an engagement server for adecision, a Visitor Client can timely, intelligently, and appropriatelydecide, relative to a context of a website visitor's interaction with awebsite, whether to engage the website visitor, when to engage thewebsite visitor, how to engage the website visitor, what engagementoptions to present to the website visitor, etc. To do so, the VisitorClient can perform real-time evaluations of engagement rules specific tothe website (referred to herein as “site rules”), taking into accountcurrent actions taken by the website visitor and contextual informationthat the Visitor Client has collected.

In this disclosure, the particular context of a website visitor'sinteraction with a website is defined by contextual informationincluding real-time events (e.g., user interface events generated byuser interaction through an input/output device such as a mouse,keyboard, etc.), visitor profile data, page metadata (e.g., title,keyword, etc.), user device details, location data (e.g., using theInternet Protocol address of the user device to lookup the city, state,and/or country of the website visitor).

In some embodiments, a Visitor Client may be configured to monitorDocument Object Model (DOM) events (e.g., via an event handler orlistener in accordance with the DOM standardized by the World Wde WebConsortium (also known as the W3C)) for reactive/proactive engagementsbased on page interaction. Additionally, with client-side data storage,data can be persisted by the Visitor Client for subsequent utilization.This enables historical data to be maintained and accounted for in aclient-side engagement decision making process. As such, the combinationof a Visitor Client and client-side data storage can result in far fewerrequests being made to server(s) at the server side and a far moreresponsive, contextually relevant, real-time engagement capability.

A method in accordance with embodiments may include, in response to awebsite visitor directing a browser running on a client device to a pageof a website, the browser requesting the page from a web server. Inresponse, the web server may return a source code file associated withthe page to the browser. The source code file may contain a reference toa script file containing instructions implementing a Visitor Client. Inloading the page, the browser retrieves and interprets the script file,thereby enabling the Visitor Client to run on the client device. If thisis the first visit by the website visitor and/or if visitor client datapersisted in a local storage has expired, the Visitor Client may loadsite rules for the website and visitor profile data for the websitevisitor, persist same in the local storage on the client device, start aclient-side decision engine, monitor the behavior of the website visitoron the page and, when and where appropriate, launch engagement widget(s)and display same via engagement channel(s) on the page for reactive orproactive engagement with the website visitor. Alternatively oradditionally, the Visitor Client may determine that the most appropriateaction is not to engage the website visitor (i.e., an inaction), giventhe context of the website visitor's interaction with the page.

While the Visitor Client is domain-specific, the context monitoringperformed by the Visitor Client can be page-specific. Furthermore,action taken by the Visitor Client can also be page-specific. Exampleactions performed by the Visitor Client may include launching one ormore engagement widgets, each engagement widget representing a type ofengagement or an engagement channel, and displaying same on the page. Inthis way, the action(s) taken by the Visitor Client and engagementchannel(s) displayed on the web page would be context-relevant.

In some embodiments, types of website visitor engagements provided by aVisitor Client can include a chat type, an email type, a document type,a link type, an offer type, etc.

In some embodiments, the type of engagement may be determined at leastin part based on a user profile associated with a website visitor. Insome embodiments, an engagement widget may be configured to generate auser interface for an engagement server. For example, a Visitor Clientmay proactively present a chat channel on a page when a website visitoris viewing a particular technical description of an item. Suppose thewebsite visitor selects the chat channel, the engagement widget for thechat channel may generate and display a chat user interface (e.g., aniFrame) on the page and open a connection connecting the chat userinterface to an engagement server. The engagement server, in turn, maynotify an agent (who is associated with the website and who is familiarwith the item and/or the particular technical description of the item)to engage with the website visitor. This type of “just-in-time”contextual engagement can be particular useful to website visitorsseeking technical support, subject matter expertise, and/or additionalinformation related on a product, etc.

In some embodiments, engagement widgets may be stored on a client deviceand/or retrieved from a server such as an application server. In someembodiments, as a website visitor navigates through a website, a VisitorClient operating on the client device may activate zero or moreengagement widgets on each page of the website, depending upon thecontext of the website visitor's behavior relative to a particular pageor a portion thereof. As the above example illustrates, embodimentsdisclosed herein can be advantageous in providing real-time,contextually relevant visitor engagement for sales, product support,website user experience, etc., significantly improving the relationshipbetween websites and their visitors.

One embodiment comprises a system comprising at least one processor andat least one non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that storescomputer instructions translatable by the at least one processor toperform a method substantially as described herein. Another embodimentcomprises a computer program product having at least one non-transitorycomputer-readable storage medium that stores computer instructionstranslatable by at least one processor to perform a method substantiallyas described herein.

Numerous other embodiments are also possible.

These, and other, aspects of the disclosure will be better appreciatedand understood when considered in conjunction with the followingdescription and the accompanying drawings. It should be understood,however, that the following description, while indicating variousembodiments of the disclosure and numerous specific details thereof, isgiven by way of illustration and not of limitation. Many substitutions,modifications, additions and/or rearrangements may be made within thescope of the disclosure without departing from the spirit thereof, andthe disclosure includes all such substitutions, modifications, additionsand/or rearrangements.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The drawings accompanying and forming part of this specification areincluded to depict certain aspects of the invention. A clearerimpression of the invention, and of the components and operation ofsystems provided with the invention, will become more readily apparentby referring to the exemplary, and therefore non-limiting, embodimentsillustrated in the drawings, wherein identical reference numeralsdesignate the same components. Note that the features illustrated in thedrawings are not necessarily drawn to scale.

FIG. 1 depicts a sequence diagram illustrating a prior art example of aserver-based approach to customer engagement;

FIG. 2 depicts a sequence diagram illustrating an example of a methodfor client-side contextual engagement with a website visitor accordingto one embodiment disclosed herein;

FIG. 3 depicts a diagrammatic representation of a network environment inwhich embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented;

FIG. 4 depicts a diagrammatic representation of an example ofclient-side contextual engagement architecture;

FIG. 5 depicts a diagrammatic representation of a user interfaceillustrating an example of a client-side contextual engagement in realtime according to one embodiment disclosed herein;

FIG. 6 depicts a diagrammatic representation of an example of a serverarchitecture according to one embodiment disclosed herein;

FIG. 7 depicts a flow diagram illustrating an example of a method forclient-side contextual engagement according to one embodiment disclosedherein;

FIG. 8 depicts a diagrammatic representation of an example of an entityrelationship diagram illustrating a site rules data structure accordingto one embodiment disclosed herein;

FIG. 9 depicts a flow diagram illustrating an example of a client-sidedecisioning process performed by a client-side decision engine accordingto one embodiment disclosed herein;

FIG. 10 depicts a sequence diagram illustrating an example of aclient-side decision engine evaluating site rules and calling a widgetmanager according to one embodiment disclosed herein; and

FIG. 11 depicts a diagrammatic representation of an example of an entityrelationship diagram illustrating an engagement widget data structureaccording to one embodiment disclosed herein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The invention and the various features and advantageous details thereofare explained more fully with reference to the non-limiting embodimentsthat are illustrated in the accompanying drawings and detailed in thefollowing description. Descriptions of well-known starting materials,processing techniques, components and equipment are omitted so as not tounnecessarily obscure the invention in detail. It should be understood,however, that the detailed description and the specific examples, whileindicating some embodiments of the invention, are given by way ofillustration only and not by way of limitation. Various substitutions,modifications, additions and/or rearrangements within the spirit and/orscope of the underlying inventive concept will become apparent to thoseskilled in the art from this disclosure.

As discussed above with reference to FIG. 1, in the field of customerengagement, although a browser and/or website can collect visitor dataand send the visitor data to an engagement server or decision engine atthe backend for further processing, such a server-based approach can beadversely impacted by many factors, including the load on the engagementserver and/or the decision engine at the server side, the cost ofkeeping an open socket/port connection to the engagement server, thedelay in between polls, the time needed to transmit/update informationfrom the client side, etc. These factors contribute to the significantchallenge in scalability and the difficulty in balancing between thelevel of contextual relevance and the speed of the decisioning processby an engagement server. As can be appreciated, it is not uncommon for awebsite visitor to leave or close a page altogether if the page istaking more than a few seconds to load. As such, websites may forgocontextual relevance in favor of speed, taking a time-based approach toengaging with their website visitors. However, as discussed above,because time-based engagement offers may lack contextual relevance,website visitors may not respond or, worse yet, may view the time-basedengagement offers as an annoyance to their website visit experience.

Embodiments disclosed herein provide a client-based approach that canaddress the aforementioned drawbacks of prior approaches and providejust-in-time, relevant contextual customer engagement. In thisdisclosure, “customer engagement” refers to the engagement of customersor potential customers with a company or a brand through an onlinemedium such as a website as well as a hybrid scenario in which acustomer's online interaction with a website (at least initially)triggers an offline customer engagement. Skilled artisans appreciatethat online customer engagement is qualitatively different from offlineengagement as the nature of customer interactions with a brand, companyand other customers differ on the Internet.

According to embodiments, to be effective in achieving the best possibleresult, a customer engagement should be:

-   -   offered at the right time (e.g., the moment a user experiences a        problem or issue);    -   the right type of engagement for the user (e.g., a video chat        for a premium-level customer); and    -   a relevant experience (e.g., displaying content such as        knowledge articles based on known information about a user who        is viewing a page and the page itself).

As an example, FIG. 2 depicts a sequence diagram illustrating a methodfor client-side contextual engagement according to one embodimentdisclosed herein. In the example of FIG. 2, system 200 may include abrowser 202 running on a client device, a website server 204 hosting awebsite, and an application server 206 hosting client-side visitorengagement control logic. Application server 206 may reside in an entitycomputing environment or hosted in a cloud computing environment.Application server 206 may operate on one or more server machines.

As will be explained in greater detail below, responsive to a websitevisitor directing browser 202 to a website, browser 202 may request aweb page from website server 204 (208). The web page (or, morespecifically, a source code file associated with the web page) returnedfrom website server 204 may include a reference (e.g., a script tag inJavaScript) to a script file hosted by application server 206 at aresource location (e.g., a network address) within application server206 (or a host server such as one in a content delivery network, asdescribed below). Browser 202 may load the web page received fromwebsite server 204. In doing so, the reference to application server 206embedded in the web page received from website server 204 causes browser202 to send a request for the referenced resource to application server206. In response, application server 206 returns a script filecontaining instructions (e.g., JavaScript code) implementing theclient-side visitor engagement control logic, referred to herein as aVisitor Client (210).

On the client device, the script file is read and interpreted by browser202 (e.g., via a JavaScript interpreter of browser 202). This enablesthe Visitor Client to run on the client device while the web page isopen on the client device. The Visitor Client may perform a number ofactions. For example, if this is the initial call (and thus there is novisitor client data persisted locally on the client device) or ifvisitor client data in a local storage on the client device has expired,the Visitor Client may pull support components (e.g., from applicationserver 206) such as site rules for the website (e.g., an engagementdefinition for this website as defined by the owner of the website), avisitor profile for the website visitor, and optionally interfaces for aplurality of engagement widgets, etc.

The Visitor Client may communicate these components to browser 202 andstore (or update, if necessary) them in the local storage on the clientdevice. Many suitable local storage means available on the client devicemay be used to implement this local storage. Example local storage meansmay include, but are not limited to, a browser cache associated withbrowser 202. As a non-limiting example, visitor client data persisted inthe local storage on the client device may include site rules, visitorprofile data, and engagement widgets.

In some embodiments, visitor profile data may include visitor details,historical details, device details, and session details. Visitor detailsmay include tags, preferences, location, etc. Historical details mayinclude the number of visits to a particular site, the number ofpurchases from the site, the knowledgebase articles viewed, and thenumber of times the visitor was invited to a chat. Device details mayinclude information on the browser used, the user device used (e.g., asmart phone, tablet, desktop computer, laptop computer, etc.), and thescreen size. Session details may include information on a referral site,the visitor journey (within the session), the value in a cart associatedwith the page, the number of engagements in the session, and whether thecheckout in the session was completed.

The visitor journey is a track file persisted locally as part of thevisitor profile data and gets sent back to the server for recordkeeping. The visitor journey may be cleared out when the session ends(e.g., a transaction is complete), but the visitor profile remains. Thevisitor journey tracks a website visitor's journey from opening(loading) a page to some predefined end. Within each journey, zero tomultiple engagements may occur.

In some embodiments, visitor profile data may be stored in a JavaScriptObject Notation (JSON) object data structure. An example visitor profileobject may have the following properties and associated data types. Insome embodiments, object data types such as those listed below mayimplement similar JSON object data structures.

Property Data Type Description tag Array of List of tags associated withthe user. Strings Useful for classifying the user. ip_address String Thecurrent IP Address for the user device Device Details on the device thatthe user Object is using browser Browser Details on the browser that theuser Object is using location Location Current location information forthe Object user preferences Preferences User preferences Object sessionSession Used for tracking information on the Object current sessionhistory History Historical metrics Object last_updated Numeric Timestampof the last time the profile was updated last_submitted NumericTimestamp of the last time the profile was submitted to the server

As directed by the Visitor Client, browser 202 may load site rules(i.e., contextual engagement rules for the particular website) andvisitor profile data from the local storage (212), start a client-sidedecision engine (214), and monitor the behavior of the website visitoron the web page (216). As the website visitor interacts with the webpage (e.g., adding an item to a cart), the Visitor Client canmonitor/listen to events occurring relative to the web page (e.g., DOMevents including mouse movement, clicks, etc. defined by the W3C for webbrowsers to notify the system in a known manner), execute the site ruleswithout calling a remote server (e.g., application server 206) at theserver side, and determine/control the appearance of an engagement layer(e.g., color, text, style, layout, etc.) overlaying the web page.

Depending upon the website visitor's behavior relative to the web page,one or more engagement widgets may be launched and correspondingengagement channels (e.g., chat, email, knowledge article, etc.)displayed via browser 202 over or on the web page that the websitevisitor is viewing (218). Each engagement channel is associated with andsupported by an engagement widget. In some embodiments, one or moreengagement widgets may be associated with one or more engagement serversconfigured to respond to requests for engagement received via the one ormore engagement widgets.

The above-described method for client-side contextual engagement with awebsite visitor can be implemented in any suitable network environment,an example of which is illustrated in FIG. 3.

In the example of FIG. 3, system 300 may include a client device 310,website server 204, application server 206, and engagement server(s) 308communicatively connected to a network 350. Website server 204 may beowned and operated by entity 380, while application server 206 may beowned and operated by entity 390. Entity 390 may be independent ofentity 380. One or more engagement servers may be owned by entity 380.One or more engagement servers may be owned by entity 390. One or moreengagement servers may be owned by a third party not owned by eitherentity 380 or entity 390.

Browser 202 described above may run on client device 310. As describedabove, responsive to a user directing browser 202 to a website 340hosted on website server 204, browser 202 may open a window 304 and senda request for web page 342 of website 340 to website server 204. Website340 may comprise one or more web pages that implement client-sidecontextual engagement supported by application server 206. As anon-limiting example, web page 342 may contain a reference 306 such as ascript tag that references a scrip file 326 hosted on application server206 (e.g., at a resource location or network address where script file326 is stored on application server 206).

In loading web page 342 (which includes reading and parsing acorresponding source code file in a markup language such as HyperTextMarkup Language or HTML), browser 202 is directed by reference 306embedded in the source code file of web page 342 to retrieve script file326 from application server 206 and interpret (e.g., via a JavaScriptinterpreter of browser 202) script file 326 which, in turn, enablesclient-side contextual visitor engagement control logic, referred to asVisitor Client 320, to run within window 304 displaying web page 342 onclient device 310. That is, in some embodiments, Visitor Client 320 maybe implemented as an application loaded into a browser window running ona client machine. Some implementations may take advantage of client-sidebrowser technologies including JavaScript and HTML5 localStorage knownto those skilled in the art. Other implementations may leverage AdobeFlash or other client-side technologies that have the same, or greater,capabilities.

With reference 306 embedded in the source code file of web page 342,Visitor Client 320 can be activated on page load and operate withinwindow 304. According to embodiments, the Visitor Client is responsiblefor pulling in a set of site rules (e.g., from site rules 328 hosted onapplication server 206) for website 340, visitor profile for a currentwebsite visitor, and optionally engagement widgets. It also evaluatesthe set of site rules on the client side, adds/removes engagementwidgets to/from the page, monitors the page for context changes, managesthe local storage, and uploads log data to the application server.

Accordingly, Visitor Client 320 may first check local storage 330 to seeif visitor client data such as site rules that are applicable to website340 are persisted in local storage 330. If not, Visitor Client 320 maypull them from application server 206. Otherwise, Visitor Client 320 mayprovide and control client-side contextual engagement relative to webpage 342 displayed in window 304 on client device 310 with insignificantsupport, if any, from application server 206. As will be discussed ingreater detail below, once the necessary client-side contextualengagement components and visitor client data have been loaded (eitherby pulling from a server, a content delivery network, a cloud, or alocal storage on a client device) in a browser window, the decisioningand contextual engagements can be managed by the Visitor Clientcompletely at the client side.

In some embodiments, Visitor Client 320 may include a plurality ofcontextual engagement components including a decision engine, a contextmonitor, and a widget manager. In some embodiments, the plurality ofcontextual engagement components can be JavaScript components that canbe persisted on a client machine.

A diagrammatic representation of an example of client-side contextualengagement architecture is shown in FIG. 4. In this example, theclient-side contextual engagement architecture may include a web browser402 having a web page 404. Web page 404 may be provided by a web server(e.g., website server 204) as described above and rendered by webbrowser 402 using HTML/Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) 406 and JavaScript408 in a known manner. For example, JavaScript 408 may include inlinescripts 410 and additional external script files 412.

In addition, JavaScript 408 may include Visitor Client 420 downloadedfrom an application server (e.g., application server 206) as describedabove. In some embodiments, Visitor Client 420 may include contextualengagement components such as a decision engine 422, a context monitor424, a storage manager 426, a widget manager 428, and a log manager 429.

In some embodiments, decision engine 422 is configured for handling theevaluation of site rules 444, calling widget manager 428 to launch anengagement, calling log manager 429 when a log event occurs, and callingcontext monitor 424 to add, remove, register, or unregister a site rule,as explained further below. Decision engine 422 can be called by contextmonitor 424 when a context changes. Decision engine 422 can beconfigured such that it is triggered at page load. Decision engine 422may determine, on page load, which rules to evaluate. Decision engine422 may evaluate the applicable rules relative to a particular context.An example of a decisioning process performed by decision engine 422 isprovided below with reference to FIG. 9. In this disclosure, a contextis defined by DOM events, visitor profile data, web page metadata,device details, and location information that can be derived from abrowser request.

In some embodiments, context monitor 424 is configured for monitoringDOM events pertaining to web page 404 and for calling decision engine422. In some embodiments, context monitor 424 may manage visitor profile446 and automatically track various pieces of information including, atthe page level, page viewed, time spent on the current page, pointingdevice (e.g., mouse) inactivity time on the current page (which mayindicate a user interest in a product or article displayed on the page),page unload, last click time, last click element, etc. At the visitorlevel, context monitor 424 may track browser and device details such asscreen size and device type (e.g., mobile, desktop, tablet, etc.). Atthe session level, context monitor 424 may track visitor journey, cartvalue, checkout status, engagement offered/accepted, etc. As discussedabove, context monitor 424 can be called by decision engine 422 and cancall decision engine 422 when the context changes and on page load. Insome embodiments, context monitor 424 may call storage manager 426 toupdate the visitor profile 446.

In some embodiments, storage manager 426 is responsible for fetchingsite rules 444, visitor profile 446, and engagement widgets 442. Storagemanager 426 may monitor expiration times of stored visitor clientcomponents and refresh (fetch) expired visitor client components(engagement widgets 442, site rules 444, visitor profile 446) stored inlocal storage 430. Storage manager 426 may be called by log manager 429to store logs and context monitor 424 to update the visitor profile 446.As a non-limiting example, on page load, storage manager 426 may set abrowser cookie such as a universally unique identifier (UUID), fetchvisitor client data 440 from an application server or a content deliverynetwork (CDN), and store in local storage 430 the browser cookie and theexpiration time set for the fetched visitor client data 440. Storagemanager 426 may refresh visitor client data 440 on the next page load ifvisitor client data 440 has expired. If needed, the UUID can be used toreload web page 404 and hence visitor client 420.

In some embodiments, widget manager 428 is configured for managing anyengagement widget added to web page 404 and displaying same asengagement channel(s)/icon(s) on web page 404. Specifically, widgetmanager 428 may handle the startup, insert, and shutdown of engagementwidgets 442. Widget manager 428 may provide an application programminginterface (API) for engagement widgets 442 to interface with othercomponents of Visitor Client 420 (e.g., per a site rule action,explained below, reactively or proactively add an engagement widget to aVisitor Client user interface, change a view of the Visitor Client userinterface, display or hide the Visitor Client user interface, etc.).Widget manager 428 may manage an engagement widget interface (e.g., aniFrame) and provide a bridge for the engagement widget interface toconnect to an engagement server at the backend. Widget manager 428 maycall context monitor 424 for context updates and may be called bydecision engine 422 when an engagement widget should be added or removedand/or by context monitor 424 when an engagement widget should benotified of a context change.

In some embodiments, log manager 429 is configured for sending log databack to the application server. In some embodiments, the log data maycomprise visitor profile data. In some embodiments, personalidentifiable information (PII) is not included in the log data that gotsent to the application server. In some embodiments, only a delta ofvisitor profile data is sent. Log manager 429 may call storage manager426 to store the log data that it had collected and may be called bycontext monitor 424 on every page load. In some embodiments, log manager429 may be trigged by an action. For example, log manager 429 may becalled by decision engine 422 if a rule dictates that the log datashould be sent to the application server and deleted from local storage430.

In the example shown in FIG. 4, a local storage 430 (e.g., anon-transitory computer readable medium or a portion thereof) may beutilized by browser 402 for persisting temporary internet files and/oradditional data 438 on a client device. As a non-limiting example,storage manager 426 of Visitor Client 420 may also utilize local storage430 for persisting visitor client data 440 which, in this example,include engagement widgets 442, site rules 444, and visitor profile 446.As a non-limiting example, an engagement widget may be implemented as aJavaScript wrapped HTML widget that contains the primary engagement userinterface to an engagement server providing a particular engagementservice. As a non-limiting example, a site rule may be implemented inthe JSON format supported by decision engine 422. As a non-limitingexample, a user profile can be implemented as an object such as a JSONobject. A user profile may be updated with context related data bycontext monitor 424 (e.g., what page is the user on). A user profile maybe managed by storage manager 426. A visitor profile may include a JSONobject of visitor data, tracked data points, static data, and journeyinformation. An example of a visitor profile JSON object data structureis provided above. Additional details on engagement widgets 442 and siterules 444 are provided below.

As discussed above, local storage 430 may be implemented using anysuitable local storage means on a client device and is not limited tousing a browser cache, HTML5 localStorage, or the like. Skilled artisansappreciate that a browser cache is a repository for stored data that isused to expedite the process of retrieving data. In some embodiments,Visitor Client 420 may utilize a browser cache to persist visitor clientdata 440 for monitoring, controlling, and providing client-sidecontextual engagements entirely on the client side and without having tocontact a remote server and/or retrieve data from the server side.Skilled artisans also appreciate that HTML5 localStorage is aclient-side key-value database for storing web application data that isnot transferred to a server. In some embodiments, Visitor Client 420 mayutilize HTML5 localStorage to persist visitor client data 440 and maycommunicate the persisted visitor client data 440, such as visitorprofile 446, or a portion thereof to a server. Persisted visitor clientdata 440 will not be deleted when web page 404 and/or browser 402 isclosed, and will be stored and available indefinitely until localstorage 430 is cleared, reformatted, or destroyed. For example, the usercan clear local storage 430, or set browser 402 to clear local storage430 when the user leaves web page 404.

When local storage 430 is emptied or cleared, all the data, includingVisitor Client 420 and visitor client data 440, are flushed away (i.e.,deleted from local storage 430). As another example, the user may runbrowser 402 in the private mode, in which case, no data is kept whenbrowser 402 is closed. Different browsers handle the private modedifferent ways, so other implementations may also be possible.Accordingly, Visitor Client 420 may or may be present on the clientdevice the next time the user visits the website. If Visitor Client 420is not already on the client device, on the next request for web page404 by browser 402, Visitor Client 420 is again retrieved and loadedwithin web page 404 as described above.

As a user interacts with web page 404 (e.g., the user puts an item in ashopping cart, the user starts to fill a text input such as an orderform, the user provides their credit card information, etc.), theirinteraction is monitored by context monitor 424 and logged by logmanager 429. Decision engine 422 can evaluate site rules 444 in contextof user interaction with web page 404 and visitor profile 446. Siterules 444 may be defined by the owner of the website and provided to theapplication server (e.g., application server 206). Site rules 444describe what contextual criteria must be satisfied before VisitorClient 420 may engage a website visitor. When initiated, Visitor Client420 may be configured to check with the application server anddynamically update site rules 444 if necessary. Accordingly, differenttypes of user actions may trigger different real time reaction and/orproactive action(s) by Visitor Client 420 (e.g., different one(s) ofengagement widgets 442, which are managed by widget manager 428, may beprovided to the user as engagement channel(s) on web page 404).

In this way, the client-side contextual engagement architecture canadvantageously eliminate the need to make customer engagement decisionson the server side in order to take real-time actions that are triggeredby events such as mouse over or clickstream. The client-side contextualengagement architecture can advance the art by reducing the number ofserver calls that otherwise would be necessary for websites to make inorder to provide contextual engagement options, such as proactive saleschat, proactive knowledge articles, reactive contextual engagement,etc., to website visitors.

Since the Visitor Client is automatically loaded on a web page and runswithin a browser window, it does not require an installation of abrowser extension or plug-in. The Visitor Client is not an independent,discrete application installed on a client device and does not requirean end user to enhance or install or even aware that the Visitor Clientis automatically pulled in by the browser. The Visitor Client does notdirectly communicate with the operating system of the client device orthe client device itself.

According to embodiments, a Visitor Client exists only within a browserwindow and is domain-specific (i.e., the Visitor Client for website Awill not function on website B which may or may not have its own VisitorClient). As a user navigates through a website that implementsclient-side contextual engagement disclosed herein, a Visitor Client forthe website may apply rules in a page-specific manner. If the user opensmultiple browser windows directed to different websites that implementclient-side contextual engagement disclosed herein, different VisitorClients may be loaded and run within the browser environment on theclient device, each Visitor Client specific to a website. These VisitorClients may be completely independent of one another as theircorresponding domains are controlled by different entities.

Referring to FIG. 4, each such Visitor Client 420 would have acorresponding set of contextual engagement components and correspondingvisitor client data 440 persisted in local storage 430. Likewise,locally persisted visitor client data 440 may include site rules 444,visitor profile 446, and optionally engagement widget 442 for eachwebsite. In some embodiments, when server-side content is required toprovide a particular engagement relative to a particular web page, acorresponding Visitor Client 420 may locate one or more engagementwidgets locally and/or on a server (e.g., via a widget manager 608 of anapplication server 602 and/or engagement widgets 642 stored in a contentdelivery network (CDN) 690, as illustrated in FIG. 6).

As an example, decision engine 422 may operate in conjunction withcontext monitor 424. Specifically, in response to a particular contextprovided by context monitor 424, decision engine 422 may access siterules 444 and visitor profile 446 and determine whether an engagement isdesired and, if so, of what type. Decision engine 422 will cause widgetmanager 428 to access one or more appropriate engagement widgets(locally from engagement widgets 442 and/or externally from CDN690/application server 602) and generate corresponding engagementchannel(s) on web page 404 (e.g., engagement channels 510 shown in FIG.5).

FIG. 5 depicts a diagrammatic representation of a user interfaceillustrating an example of a client-side contextual engagement in realtime according to one embodiment disclosed herein. As discussed above, auser action (or combination(s) of actions) that matters to the websitecan be identified beforehand, and proper responses when all theconditions (e.g., as defined in site rules 444) are satisfied can bedetermined in advance (e.g., by the owner of the website) and evaluatedin real time by the Visitor Client (Visitor Client 420) at the clientside. In this example, a user has placed an item in a shopping cart 501via web page 500 and entered a coupon code that is not valid. The itemin shopping cart 501 has a unit price of over $500. In this context, theVisitor Client may take action in real time by determining andimmediately displaying appropriate engagement channels 510 (e.g., onengagement layer or Visitor Client user interface 550 overlaying webpage 500) without having to contact a server at the backend.

In the example of FIG. 5, engagement channels 510 include a callchannel, a knowledge channel, an email channel, and a chat channel.Although FIG. 5 shows four engagement channels, skilled artisansappreciate that embodiments of the Visitor Client may determine andprovide zero or more engagement channels to a website visitor, given thecontext of the website visitor's interaction with a web page.Furthermore, although not shown in FIG. 5, other types of engagementssuch as video chat, may also be determined and provided by the VisitorClient disclosed herein. Clicking on or otherwise selecting anengagement channel (represented by a corresponding icon as shown in FIG.5) may result in a display of an appropriate engagement window thatallows for accessing an engagement server, as will be discussed ingreater detail below.

As illustrated in FIG. 5, when an engagement channel (e.g., theknowledge channel) is selected, a widget manager (e.g., widget manager428 described above) may operate to open a popup engagement window orinterface 512 to an engagement server. In this example, interface 512 ofthe knowledge channel provides a connection to a knowledge base server(which is a type of an engagement server). Interface 512 may displayarticles 520 from the knowledge base that are relevant to the contextand may include an input field 522 where the user may enter keywords ora query to search the knowledge base for more information. A log manager(e.g., log manager 429 described above) may record details of theseinteractions and store same in a visitor profile (e.g., visitor profile446 described above).

A diagrammatic representation of an example of server architectureaccording to one embodiment disclosed herein is shown in FIG. 6. In theembodiment illustrated, server architecture 600 includes an applicationserver 602 and a content delivery network 690. Application server 602may include one or more engagement manger applications, such as a rulesmanager 606, a widget manager 608, and a profile manager 610. Rulesmanager 606 may be configured for managing site rules for websites thatimplement client-side contextual engagement (e.g., site rules 444 forweb page 404). For example, in response to a request from the website,rules manager 606 may update site rules 444 for web page 404. In someembodiments, site rules managed by rules manager 606 may be pushed toCDN 690 and stored as site rules 644 on CDN 690. CDN 690 may providesite rules 644 as requested (e.g., by Visitor Client 420). In someembodiments, engagement widgets 642 and visitor profile 646 may beoffloaded to CDN 690 in a similar manner. However, no PII is ever storedon CDN 690. In some embodiments, various visitor clients 630, each for adifferent web site, may also be offloaded to CDN 690. Other deliverymechanisms may also be implemented to provide the Visitor Client (e.g.,Visitor Client 420) to a browser (e.g., browser 402) running on a clientdevice.

FIG. 7 depicts a flow diagram illustrating an example of a method forclient-side contextual engagement according to one embodiment disclosedherein. As described above, a website visitor may direct a browser to awebsite that subscribes to otherwise implements client-side contextualengagement services provided by an application server (e.g., applicationserver 206). Method 700 may occur initially on loading a web page ofsuch a website. The source code of the page may include an embeddedreference (e.g., reference 306) to a script file (e.g., script file 326)that implements a Visitor Client (e.g., Visitor Client 320). As directedby the Visitor Client, the browser may load contextual engagementcomponents (also referred to as visitor client components) (702). Asdiscussed above, visitor client components can include a decisionengine, a context monitor, a storage manager, a widget manager, and alog manager.

At 704, the storage manager may check a local storage and determine ifthere is a need to fetch visitor client data (e.g., visitor client datadoes not exist or has expired). The visitor client data may be fetchedas needed (706). In some embodiments, some site rules may allow forthird-party data to be used through a server connector network to theapplication server, in which case, the third-party data may be fetchedas well. Next, the loaded visitor client components are initialized(708). Once initialized, the log manager may send profile data to theapplication server (710), the context monitor may start to monitor theclient's usage of the web site (712), and the decision engine mayevaluate the rules to determine if, when, and of what kind of engagementshould be presented on the page that the website visitor is viewing.

As discussed above, the decision engine is configured for evaluatingsite rules and executing actions. Site rules may be defined per site andstored in a file accessible by the decision engine. In some embodiments,site rules may be registered. A rule that is registered for a site meansthat the rule needs to be evaluated for the site. Registration allowsscoping and scheduling—what rules should be evaluated and when. This isan efficient mechanism for rules evaluation as to what (selection), when(time), and where (location). Specifically, a section in the ruledefinition file called “scope” allows the decision engine to perform aquick scan on two or more values (e.g., time and location (pageaddress)) across all domain-specific site rules and determine which siterules apply to the current page and/or time (which may change from pageto page). As a non-limiting example, a site rule may specify that a chatchannel is only available between the hours of 9 AM and 5 PM. If a uservisits the website at 8:50 AM, the decision engine may determine not toactivate the chat channel because no chat agent is available at thattime. As another example, a website may have a set of pages and 1000rules. Not all 1000 rules may apply to each of the set of pages. This isreferred to as “scoping.” Even for rules that do apply to a page, theirapplication may depend upon the time of day. This is referred to as“scheduling.” Such scoping and scheduling in rules evaluation allow thedecision engine to quickly and efficiently eliminate site rules that donot apply (not the right page or not the right time, regardless of whatthat rule defines) and apply only those site rules that matter.

Site rules can be built to determine when and how visitors to a websiteare to be engaged (e.g., via various engagement channels such as call,chat, knowledge/article, email, etc.). Site rules may be defined basedon criteria and actions. Criteria are conditions that must be satisfiedbefore an action or actions can take place. In embodiments disclosedherein, site rules implement an innovative structure and serve aspecific purpose of client-side contextual engagement. As a non-limitingexample, an entity relationship diagram for the site rules datastructure used by the decision engine disclosed herein is illustrated inFIG. 8. Skilled artisans appreciate that other site rules datastructures may be adapted or otherwise implemented for used by thedecision engine disclosed herein.

In some embodiments, the site rules and related function libraries arecompiled or otherwise combined into a single file (i.e., a site rulesdefinition file for a particular website) and hosted on the applicationserver or placed on a CDN for the Visitor Client to retrieve (whenneeded) and load. As a non-limiting example, the site rules definitionfile may include a scope section defining one or more scope functionsneeded by the site rules defined in the site rules definition file. Theactions and function libraries needed by the site rules defined in thesite rules definition file may be stripped to contain only the necessaryproperties.

As illustrated in FIG. 8, the site rules data structure does notimplement if/then statements. The elimination of if/then statements fromsite rules can reduce, if not eliminate, the need for a complex andsophisticated server-side decision engine, allowing for a very efficientclient-side decision engine. In some embodiments, specific functionsthat can be used to acquire information from a page may be defined usinga page data library. Other implementations of the site rules datastructure may also be possible.

With the site rules data structure, site rules can describe what type ofengagement should be presented on a website. Because the visitorbehavior (page visits, actions taken on the page, etc.) and the currentpage context are available for use by the decision engine at the clientside, they can also be used as part of the criteria for determiningwhether to engage, and the type of engagement to present. Visitorbehavior, including their journey throughout the website, cart actions,checkout, as well as page events, like displaying of errors, can besaved in the local storage for use in subsequent evaluations as well.

In some embodiments, the decision engine of the Visitor Client mayprocess site rules specific to the website with which the user isinteracting. In some embodiments, a site rule is a combination offunctions: location, criteria, and action.

In some embodiments, “location” refers to a zone of a site or the entiresite (e.g., a specific web page). Thus, this is a function fordetermining whether the criteria should be evaluated.

In some embodiments, “criteria” refers to a set of (zero or more) pertype functions that, when evaluated, returns a true or false or error(which are the only possible outcomes in some embodiments). In someembodiments, criteria may include visitor criteria and behaviorcriteria. Visitor criteria may include device data, stored cookie data,stored visitor profile data/identity data, or a combination thereof.Behavior criteria may include pages visited, actions performed, etc. Insome embodiments, criteria are conditions that must be satisfied beforean action can take place. In some embodiments, when multiple criteriaare considered, they are evaluated using “AND” operators. When multiplecriterion values are specified, they are evaluated using “OR” operators.Criteria may include exceptions: “Except when . . . ”

As a specific example, criteria for a page where the title of the pagecontains “product” may include the following:

-   -   1) a user has been on a particular page for more than a        specified time (e.g., 15 seconds)    -   2) a user's cart contains item(s) having a total value that        meets or exceeds a specified amount (e.g., $500.00)    -   3) the current product has a value that meets or exceeds a        specified amount (e.g., $200.00)    -   4) a visitor profile contains a high value (HV) tag    -   5) a local event has occurred (e.g., moused over ad, etc.)    -   6) a user inputs a certain word (e.g., “rich”) into a certain        field    -   7) a client side product configuration adjustment has occurred        (e.g., due to customer interaction with a browser/web page to        change something about the product)

In some embodiments, “action” may be one of three possible actions:success, failure, error (partial success). Actions may be triggered whenall criteria for a given rule are satisfied. Examples of actions mayinclude, proactively engage, update a visitor profile, push visitorprofile data to the server, call a custom server action, etc.

Skilled artisans appreciate that domain-specific site rules disclosedherein are well-defined. They are not abstract, generic, or “if/then”statements. Since such statements do not exist in domain-specific siterules disclosed herein, the decision engine of the Visitor Client (e.g.,decision engine 422 of Visitor Client 420) does not need to perform“if,” “then,” “or” analyses.

In some embodiments, “scoping” is used by the decision engine (e.g.,decision engine 422) to define limitations on when certain site rulesare evaluated at the client side. In some embodiments, the decisionengine may evaluate a scope, if any, to determine whether to proceedwith evaluating a site rule. If the scope returns false, the site ruleassociated with the scope is skipped. When a criterion is met (e.g., auser's pointing device hovers over or touches a specified location), areal time, localized decisioning may be made and an action communicatedto an appropriate party for a specific engagement in context of the userand the user's interaction with the location.

For example, an action may be specified that when a user's pointingdevice hovers over or touches a specified location, send a notice to awidget manager (e.g., widget manager 428). The widget manager may causea chat window to pop up right after the user's pointing device hoversover or touches the specified location, perhaps in proximity to thelocation, with an inviting message: “let me help you with this product.”

As another example, an action may be specified that when a criterion ismet, a customer representative is notified immediately. The customerrepresentative or sales agent may attempt to engage with the user viaone or more engagement channels. Examples of engagement channels mayinclude online channels such as email, instant messaging, video chat,etc. as well as offline channels such as faxing, telephone calls, etc.The customer representative or sales agent may already have the user'sphone number on file (in the user profile communicated to the agent viathe Visitor Client) and may call the user upon receipt of the noticethat the criterion is met.

In some embodiments, a Visitor Client may run continuously on a clientdevice, evaluating domain-specific site rules in real-time as a websitevisitor interacts with a web page. The exact moment that a rule passes,appropriate engagement channel(s) may appear on the web page, allowingfor immediate engagement with the website visitor. This can result in anextremely fast initiation of an engagement, which is crucial insituations where a website visitor may be about to abandon the website(e.g., due to a poor experience, or receiving too many errors on aform). This approach eliminates the lag between events occurring on theclient-side and the decision to engage.

An example of a decisioning process performed by the decision engine ofa Visitor Client is illustrated in FIG. 9. In some embodiments, adecision engine of a Visitor Client is called on a page load, as aresult of an event callback, or by a context monitor of the VisitorClient to process site rules applicable to the page (e.g., site rulesthat are registered to be monitored for the particular site to which thepage belongs) and execute actions. Action(s) can be called upon successof all the criteria in a rule or failure of any criterion.

As discussed above, the decision engine of the Visitor Client evaluates,at the client side, whether a website visitor's activities satisfydomain-specific site rules defined by the website owner. Each site rulemay comprise a list of one or more criteria which the decision enginemay iterate through. For example, the decision engine may determine if arule scope is null (902). If not, the decision engine may determinewhether the rule scope (e.g., location or time, as described above) istrue (904). If the scope does not apply, the decision engine gets thenext rule for evaluation (916). If the scope function returns true, orif the scope was null, the decision engine retrieves the next criterionfunction from the list for evaluation (906). The decision engine maydetermine if the criterion is satisfied (i.e., the criterion functionreturns true) (908). If not, then in some embodiments, an action failurefunction may be called (913). Then, a determination is made as towhether the last rule has been processed (914). If not, the next rule isfetched for evaluation (916). If the criterion function returns true(908), the decision engine may determine if the criterion is the lastone in the rule (910). If the criterion is not the last one in the rule,the decision engine may proceed to check the next criterion (906). Ifthe criterion is the last one in the rule, an action success function iscalled (912). Finally, a determination is made as to whether the lastrule has been processed/evaluated (914). If not, decisioning process 900may loop back and the decision engine may proceed to get the next rule(916). Decisioning process 900 stops when the last rule has beenevaluated.

In some embodiments, an action library may be defined in thedomain-specific rules definition file described above and may include alist of all the actions that can result from a rules evaluationpertaining to a page in the particular domain. Actions in the actionlibrary may be called upon success (of all the criteria in a rule) orfailure (of any criterion in the rule).

As a non-limiting example, an action success function when called mayoperate to generate an appropriate engagement widget, add the engagementwidget to the web page (e.g., via an engagement layer implementing theVisitor Client), and display the engagement widget on the web page(e.g., via an engagement layer or a Visitor Client user interface suchas Visitor Client user interface 550 shown in FIG. 5). An example ofthis process is illustrated in the sequence diagram depicted in FIG. 10.Each of engagement widget thus generated can function as aself-contained application that can be accessed via the Visitor Clientuser interface. An entity relationship implementing a data structure foran example engagement widget is illustrated in FIG. 11. Skilled artisansappreciate that engagement widgets can be implemented in many ways andare not limited to those disclosed herein.

Embodiments disclosed herein can provide many advantages. For example,the client-side contextual engagement decision making process describedabove is significantly faster than prior solutions, as it does notrequire communication to a decision engine executing on a server at thebackend. Moreover, the client-side contextual engagement decision makingprocess described above is decentralized, requiring far fewer serverresources per visitor. Furthermore, the client-side contextualengagement decision making process described above can take into accountthe current web page context and events in real-time to thereby providehighly relevant and timely contextual engagement with website visitors.Relevancy may be determined, for example, by comparing the conversionrate of people engaged with a website implementing the client-sidecontextual engagement disclosed herein and the conversion rate of peopleengaged with a website implementing a time- or server-based approach.

Embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented in various types of dataprocessing systems. As an example, a suitable data processing system mayinclude at least one central processing unit (CPU) or processor coupledto one or more user input/output (I/O) devices and non-transitory memorydevices. Examples of I/O devices may include, but are not limited to,keyboards, displays, monitors, touch screens, printers, electronicpointing devices such as mice, trackballs, styluses, touch pads, or thelike. Examples of memory devices may include, but are not limited to,hard drives (HDs), magnetic disk drives, optical disk drives, magneticcassettes, tape drives, flash memory cards, random access memories(RAMs), read-only memories (ROMs), smart cards, etc. A data processingsystem embodying a Visitor Client disclosed herein can be coupled to adisplay, an information device, and various peripheral devices such asprinters, plotters, speakers, etc. through one or more I/O devices. Adata processing system embodying a Visitor Client disclosed herein mayalso be coupled to external computers or other devices through a networkinterface, a wireless transceiver, or other means that is coupled to anetwork such as a local area network (LAN), wide area network (WAN), orthe Internet.

Those skilled in the relevant art will appreciate that the invention canbe implemented or practiced with other computer system configurations,including without limitation multi-processor systems, network devices,mini-computers, mainframe computers, data processors, and the like. Theinvention can be embodied in a general purpose computer, or a specialpurpose computer or data processor that is specifically programmed,configured, or constructed to perform the functions described in detailherein. The invention can also be employed in distributed computingenvironments, where tasks or modules are performed by remote processingdevices, which are linked through a communications network such as aLAN, WAN, and/or the Internet. In a distributed computing environment,program modules or subroutines may be located in both local and remotememory storage devices. These program modules or subroutines may, forexample, be stored or distributed on computer-readable media, includingmagnetic and optically readable and removable computer discs, stored asfirmware in chips, as well as distributed electronically over theInternet or over other networks (including wireless networks). Examplechips may include Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory(EEPROM) chips. Embodiments discussed herein can be implemented insuitable instructions that may reside on a non-transitory computerreadable medium, hardware circuitry or the like, or any combination andthat may be translatable by one or more server machines. Examples of anon-transitory computer readable medium are provided below in thisdisclosure.

ROM, RAM, and HD are computer memories for storing computer-executableinstructions executable by the CPU or capable of being compiled orinterpreted to be executable by the CPU. Suitable computer-executableinstructions may reside on a computer readable medium (e.g., ROM, RAM,and/or HD), hardware circuitry or the like, or any combination thereof.Within this disclosure, the term “computer readable medium” is notlimited to ROM, RAM, and HD and can include any type of data storagemedium that can be read by a processor. Examples of computer-readablestorage media can include, but are not limited to, volatile andnon-volatile computer memories and storage devices such as random accessmemories, read-only memories, hard drives, data cartridges, directaccess storage device arrays, magnetic tapes, floppy diskettes, flashmemory drives, optical data storage devices, compact-disc read-onlymemories, and other appropriate computer memories and data storagedevices. Thus, a computer-readable medium may refer to a data cartridge,a data backup magnetic tape, a floppy diskette, a flash memory drive, anoptical data storage drive, a CD-ROM, ROM, RAM, HD, or the like.

The processes described herein may be implemented in suitablecomputer-executable instructions that may reside on a computer readablemedium (for example, a disk, CD-ROM, a memory, etc.). Alternatively, thecomputer-executable instructions may be stored as software codecomponents on a direct access storage device array, magnetic tape,floppy diskette, optical storage device, or other appropriatecomputer-readable medium or storage device.

Any suitable programming language can be used to implement the routines,methods or programs of embodiments of the invention described herein,including C, C++, Java, JavaScript, HTML, or any other programming orscripting code, etc. Other software/hardware/network architectures maybe used. For example, the functions of the disclosed embodiments may beimplemented on one computer or shared/distributed among two or morecomputers in or across a network. Communications between computersimplementing embodiments can be accomplished using any electronic,optical, radio frequency signals, or other suitable methods and tools ofcommunication in compliance with known network protocols.

Different programming techniques can be employed such as procedural orobject oriented. Any particular routine can execute on a single computerprocessing device or multiple computer processing devices, a singlecomputer processor or multiple computer processors. Data may be storedin a single storage medium or distributed through multiple storagemediums, and may reside in a single database or multiple databases (orother data storage techniques). Although the steps, operations, orcomputations may be presented in a specific order, this order may bechanged in different embodiments. In some embodiments, to the extentmultiple steps are shown as sequential in this specification, somecombination of such steps in alternative embodiments may be performed atthe same time. The sequence of operations described herein can beinterrupted, suspended, or otherwise controlled by another process, suchas an operating system, kernel, etc. The routines can operate in anoperating system environment or as stand-alone routines. Functions,routines, methods, steps and operations described herein can beperformed in hardware, software, firmware or any combination thereof.

Embodiments described herein can be implemented in the form of controllogic in software or hardware or a combination of both. The controllogic may be stored in an information storage medium, such as acomputer-readable medium, as a plurality of instructions adapted todirect an information processing device to perform a set of stepsdisclosed in the various embodiments. Based on the disclosure andteachings provided herein, a person of ordinary skill in the art willappreciate other ways and/or methods to implement the invention.

It is also within the spirit and scope of the invention to implement insoftware programming or code an of the steps, operations, methods,routines or portions thereof described herein, where such softwareprogramming or code can be stored in a computer-readable medium and canbe operated on by a processor to permit a computer to perform any of thesteps, operations, methods, routines or portions thereof describedherein. The invention may be implemented by using software programmingor code in one or more general purpose digital computers, by usingapplication specific integrated circuits, programmable logic devices,field programmable gate arrays, optical, chemical, biological, quantumor nanoengineered systems, components and mechanisms may be used. Ingeneral, the functions of the invention can be achieved by any means asis known in the art. For example, distributed, or networked systems,components and circuits can be used. In another example, communicationor transfer (or otherwise moving from one place to another) of data maybe wired, wireless, or by any other means.

A “computer-readable medium” may be any medium that can contain, store,communicate, propagate, or transport the program for use by or inconnection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, system ordevice. The computer readable medium can be, by way of example only butnot by limitation, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic,infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, system, device,propagation medium, or computer memory. Such computer-readable mediumshall generally be machine readable and include software programming orcode that can be human readable (e.g., source code) or machine readable(e.g., object code). Examples of non-transitory computer-readable mediacan include random access memories, read-only memories, hard drives,data cartridges, magnetic tapes, floppy diskettes, flash memory drives,optical data storage devices, compact-disc read-only memories, and otherappropriate computer memories and data storage devices. In anillustrative embodiment, some or all of the software components mayreside on a single server computer or on any combination of separateserver computers. As one skilled in the art can appreciate, a computerprogram product implementing an embodiment disclosed herein may compriseone or more non-transitory computer readable media storing computerinstructions translatable by one or more processors in a computingenvironment.

A “processor” includes any, hardware system, mechanism or component thatprocesses data, signals or other information. A processor can include asystem with a general-purpose central processing unit, multipleprocessing units, dedicated circuitry for achieving functionality, orother systems. Processing need not be limited to a geographic location,or have temporal limitations. For example, a processor can perform itsfunctions in “real-time,” “offline,” in a “batch mode,” etc. Portions ofprocessing can be performed at different times and at differentlocations, by different (or the same) processing systems.

As used herein, the terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,”“including,” “has,” “having,” or any other variation thereof, areintended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion. For example, a process,product, article, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements is notnecessarily limited only those elements but may include other elementsnot expressly listed or inherent to such product, process, article, orapparatus.

Furthermore, the term “or” as used herein is generally intended to mean“and/or” unless otherwise indicated. For example, a condition A or B issatisfied by any one of the following: A is true (or present) and B isfalse (or not present), A is false (or not present) and B is true (orpresent), and both A and B are true (or present). As used herein, a termpreceded by “a” or “an” (and “the” when antecedent basis is “a” or “an”)includes both singular and plural of such term, unless clearly indicatedotherwise (i.e., that the reference “a” or “an” clearly indicates onlythe singular or only the plural). Also, as used in the descriptionherein, the meaning of “in” includes “in” and “on” unless the contextclearly dictates otherwise.

It will also be appreciated that one or more of the elements depicted inthe drawings/figures can also be implemented in a more separated orintegrated manner, or even removed or rendered as inoperable in certaincases, as is useful in accordance with a particular application.Additionally, any signal arrows in the drawings/figures should beconsidered only as exemplary, and not limiting, unless otherwisespecifically noted. The scope of the invention should be determined bythe following claims and their legal equivalents.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for client-side contextual engagement,the method comprising: monitoring, by a visitor client on a user device,a web page for any changes to a context of a website visitor viewing theweb page on the user device, the visitor client storing visitor clientdata including site rules and visitor profile data locally on the userdevice, the visitor client having a context monitor, a decision engine,and a widget manager, wherein the context monitor is configured forcalling the decision engine, wherein the decision engine is configuredfor evaluating the site rules relative to the context, wherein thewidget manager is configured for managing the visitor client data storedon the user device, the web page having a reference to a script file ata network address, the script file retrieved from the network address toimplement the visitor client, the visitor client automatically loaded onthe web page and run within a browser window by a browser on the userdevice without requiring an installation of a browser extension orplug-in, the context defined by at least one of a document object modelevent, the visitor profile data associated with the website visitor, webpage metadata for the web page, device details about the user device, orlocation information derived from a browser request; detecting, by thevisitor client on the user device, a first change to the context of thewebsite visitor viewing the web page on the user device; responsive tothe detecting of the first change to the context of the website visitorviewing the web page on the user device, executing the site rules by thevisitor client on the user device without calling a server, makingcustomer engagement decisions by the visitor client on the user devicewithout a need to make a customer engagement decision on server side,and determining and displaying, by the visitor client on the user devicewithout contacting a server, engagement channels in a visitor clientinterface overlaying the web page; retrieving, by the visitor client onthe user device, an article from a knowledge base server, the articlerelevant to the context of the website visitor viewing the web page onthe user device, relevant to the first change, or relevant to knowninformation about the website visitor from the visitor profile dataassociated with the website visitor; and proactively delivering, by thevisitor client on the user device through a first engagement channel ofthe engagement channels associated with the visitor client userinterface on the web page, the article from the knowledge base server tothe website visitor viewing the web page on the user device without userintervention.
 2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the detectingcomprises detecting a pointing device hovering over or touching aspecified location within the web page.
 3. The method according to claim2, wherein the specified location within the web page comprises a datapoint that is tracked by the visitor client on the user device.
 4. Themethod according to claim 1, wherein the visitor profile data associatedwith the website visitor comprises historical details, the historicaldetails comprising information on knowledgebase articles viewed by thewebsite visitor.
 5. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:launching an engagement widget, the engagement widget associated withthe knowledge base server and the first engagement channel.
 6. Themethod according to claim 1, wherein different types of user actions onthe web page by the website visitor trigger different real timereactions or one or more proactive actions by the visitor client.
 7. Themethod according to claim 6, wherein the one or more proactive actionsby the visitor client comprise providing a proactive chat channel.
 8. Asystem for client-side contextual engagement, the system comprising: aprocessor; a non-transitory computer-readable memory; and storedinstructions translatable by the processor to perform: monitoring, by avisitor client on a user device, a web page on the user device for anychanges to a context of a website visitor viewing the web page on theuser device, the visitor client storing visitor client data includingsite rules and visitor profile data locally on the user device, thevisitor client having a context monitor, a decision engine, and a widgetmanager, wherein the context monitor is configured for calling thedecision engine, wherein the decision engine is configured forevaluating the site rules relative to the context, wherein the widgetmanager is configured for managing the visitor client data stored on theuser device, the web page having a reference to a script file at anetwork address, the script file retrieved from the network address toimplement the visitor client, the visitor client automatically loaded onthe web page and run within a browser window by a browser on the userdevice without requiring an installation of a browser extension orplug-in, the context defined by at least one of a document object modelevent, the visitor profile data associated with the website visitor, webpage metadata for the web page, device details about the user device, orlocation information derived from a browser request; detecting a firstchange to the context of the website visitor viewing the web page on theuser device; responsive to the detecting of the first change to thecontext of the website visitor viewing the web page on the user device,executing the site rules by the visitor client on the user devicewithout calling a server, making customer engagement decisions by thevisitor client on the user device without a need to make a customerengagement decision on server side, and determining and displaying, bythe visitor client on the user device without contacting a server,engagement channels in a visitor client interface overlaying the webpage; retrieving an article from a knowledge base server, the articlerelevant to the context of the website visitor viewing the web page onthe user device, relevant to the first change, or relevant to knowninformation about the website visitor from the visitor profile dataassociated with the website visitor; and proactively delivering, througha first engagement channel of the engagement channels associated withthe visitor client user interface on the web page, the article from theknowledge base server to the website visitor viewing the web page on theuser device without user intervention.
 9. The system of claim 8, whereinthe detecting comprises detecting a pointing device hovering over ortouching a specified location within the web page.
 10. The system ofclaim 9, wherein the specified location within the web page comprises adata point that is tracked by the visitor client on the user device. 11.The system of claim 8, wherein the visitor profile data associated withthe website visitor comprises historical details, the historical detailscomprising information on knowledgebase articles viewed by the websitevisitor.
 12. The system of claim 8, wherein the stored instructions arefurther translatable by the processor for: launching an engagementwidget, the engagement widget associated with the knowledge base serverand the first engagement channel.
 13. The system of claim 8, whereindifferent types of user actions on the web page by the website visitortrigger different real time reactions or one or more proactive actionsby the visitor client.
 14. The system of claim 13, wherein the one ormore proactive actions by the visitor client comprise providing aproactive chat channel.
 15. A computer program product for client-sidecontextual engagement, the computer program product comprising anon-transitory computer-readable memory storing instructionstranslatable by a processor of a user device to perform: monitoring, bya visitor client on the user device, a web page on the user device forany changes to a context of a website visitor viewing the web page onthe user device, the visitor client storing visitor client dataincluding site rules and visitor profile data locally on the userdevice, the visitor client having a context monitor, a decision engine,and a widget manager, wherein the context monitor is configured forcalling the decision engine, wherein the decision engine is configuredfor evaluating the site rules relative to the context, wherein thewidget manager is configured for managing the visitor client data storedon the user device, the web page having a reference to a script file ata network address, the script file retrieved from the network address toimplement the visitor client, the visitor client automatically loaded onthe web page and run within a browser window by a browser on the userdevice without requiring an installation of a browser extension orplug-in, the context defined by at least one of a document object modelevent, the visitor profile data associated with the website visitor, webpage metadata for the web page, device details about the user device, orlocation information derived from a browser request; detecting a firstchange to the context of the website visitor viewing the web page on theuser device; responsive to the detecting of the first change to thecontext of the website visitor viewing the web page on the user device,executing the site rules by the visitor client on the user devicewithout calling a server, making customer engagement decisions by thevisitor client on the user device without a need to make customerengagement decision on server side, and determining and displaying, bythe visitor client on the user device without contacting a server,engagement channels in a visitor client interface overlaying the webpage; retrieving an article from a knowledge base server, the articlerelevant to the context of the website visitor viewing the web page onthe user device, relevant to the first change, or relevant to knowninformation about the website visitor from the visitor profile dataassociated with the website visitor; and proactively delivering, througha first engagement channel of the engagement channels associated withthe visitor client user interface on the web page, the article from theknowledge base server to the website visitor viewing the web page on theuser device without user intervention.
 16. The computer program productof claim 15, wherein the detecting comprises detecting a pointing devicehovering over or touching a specified location within the web page. 17.The computer program product of claim 16, wherein the specified locationwithin the web page comprises a data point that is tracked by thevisitor client on the user device.
 18. The computer program product ofclaim 15, wherein the visitor profile data associated with the websitevisitor comprises historical details, the historical details comprisinginformation on knowledgebase articles viewed by the website visitor. 19.The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the instructions arefurther translatable by the processor for: launching an engagementwidget, the engagement widget associated with the knowledge base serverand the first engagement channel.
 20. The computer program product ofclaim 15, wherein different types of user actions on the web page by thewebsite visitor trigger different real time reactions or one or moreproactive actions by the visitor client.